RSS

How-To Geek

In 1993, Douglas Adams–of The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy fame–lent his creative talent and voice to explaining the invention of the Ebook.

The audio segment was produced almost 20 years ago by Adams to both promote his own work in digital format and the work of early ebook publisher Voyager Expanded Books. You may notice Adams refers to their product as a PowerBook, a name they kept until they heard Apple would be releasing a laptop with the same name (from then on the product was simply referred to as Expanded Books).

The thoroughly modern video accompanying Adams concise and entertaining description of book history is an animation courtesy of U.K. designer Gavin Edwards, which he submitted to a contest hosted by The Literary Platform intended to match a clever animation with Adam’s monologue.

Jason Fitzpatrick is warranty-voiding DIYer and all around geek. When he's not documenting mods and hacks he's doing his best to make sure a generation of college students graduate knowing they should put their pants on one leg at a time and go on to greatness, just like Bruce Dickinson. You can follow him on Google+ if you'd like.

Amazing to think that things like the Kindle are only becoming truly popular now, despite the technology and vision being around so long ago. I think it’s vital that authors take a leaf from Adams’ book (no pun intended) and recognise the role that technology can play in the world of literature. Authors like Andrew Tyler are now taking this idea further, with interactive websites to accompany books (www.tmotco.co.uk). Long live the innovative author!